I am a brony from St.-Petersburg, Russia. Looking up to Thirty Minute Ponies, I started a Russian writing prompt, which we called simply Russian Pony Writing Prompt. We are writing short pony stories in an hour each Wednesday and Saturday. We started in February and now at Prompt #44, with hundreds of stories written. I created a FiMFiction group for our little project, with hopes to translate some of the stories into English, to bring the Russian brony fandom closer to the rest of the world. If you ever wondered, we do have fandom and fanfiction, just no regular writing prompts before this one. Oh, and I asked Obselescence to give us a first prompt. Maybe you heard of him; he was one of the organizers of Thirty Minute Ponies. Anyway, his prompt was "Celestia has a holiday". The prompt took off immediately; we received 20 entries on that first day. One was a poem even; I was going to have a translator translate it, but haven't gotten around to proofreading and properly publishing on FiMFiction yet; here it is.

So, me and my friend whom I met through this writing prompt are coming to Crystal Fair and we'd like to meet any of you and also, if it wouldn't be too much to ask, probably we could stay with you? If not, then just meeting will be grand. Will there be any brony meetup in Helsinki on 1st or 2nd of June, just before the convention? My friend will work as a volunteer, so he might already get busy on 3rd.

I don't know if the idea of strangers staying in your home sounds weird; I vaguely remember that it was, for me. Then I heard of Couchsurfing. You know, there's this idea that travellers can travel by staying in each others' homes. I remember cautiously reading the gushing Couchsurfer's reviews leave of their travels, thinking something like "are they some kind of brainwashed cultists?" Then I went to a local Couchsurfing meetup in St.-Petersburg and found that these people are ok. I created a profile and travelled to Finland a bit and hosted a couple of people; the experience was awesome. I wish I could travel more; lately I don't have either time or money: I'm working as a freelancer and my schedule is hectic. When you travel without a set plan and don't know where you'll stay next, but it always happens that you'll end up staying with awesome people, it feels like a leap of faith; as if you can fall without looking and the Earth will always catch you with caring hands. This is an illusion, of course, but a pleasant one and harmless, if you know what you're doing: I only met with great people via Couchsurfing and I hope it will stay that way, but caution and common sense won't hurt: I always look into the profile of people I contact, and if I something is off, or the person can't be bothered to spell, or anything looks wrong to me - I pass on these people. So now I am going to tell you all I can so that you can see I'm a nice person and all, and deanonymize myself however I can.

Here is my Couchsurfing and a bunch of other profiles; you can check the nice things some people bothered to write about me on Couchsurfing; seriously, I didn't ask them to; I didn't even leave a comment for them (shame on lazy me).

I really like bronies who not only consume, but produce something of their own, be it fanfiction, music or something else, like the plushies this homey is doing (it's a pity he's not coming to Crystal Fair). Even original opinion is good.

I like reading and I like computers; I believe that there is a lot of unexplored potential at the intersection of prose and computers; the potential that only we (as in, humanity) just started exploring in 1980s, but then abandoned altogether. Did you know that Douglas Adams worked with game developers on an interactive fiction title, Infocom's titles were sold in book stores and one interactive fiction won a literary award, back when they did allow interactive works there? I forgot which one that was; I thought it was Amnesia (1986), but that was written by Hugo and Nebula-winning Thomas M. Disch, instead. Anyway, I am sympathetic to the look of one indie game developer who said "We discovered four letters and ran away to write books with them; what we should do is learn more letters, first." Interactive medium that we call games now, he argues, has it own language that is still not understood.

I hope to contribute my humble little bit to trying to "upgrade the prose". I would like to write an interactive piece of fanfiction that is a bit more than text. Maybe something like Almost Goodbye but with pictures and with an ending that you can influence, but cannot change, for a start? And with ponies, of course.

I like science because it works and I like science fiction because it opens us the new horizons and shows what could be; but I think that lately science changed our world so much that people have trouble catching up, and afraid and unwilling to look further still, which is a shame. I think it is quite likely that within our lifetime the scientific progress will change us and the world around us in a way that we cannot imagine; and instead of denying it we'd better make sure that it will be good. If you heard of the idea of intelligence explosion - that's what I think is a likely scenario. But I don't pray to Kurzweil or believe some stupid things you might think I believe. If you didn't heard of Kurzweil or singularity - nevermind; Facing the Intelligence Explosion is a good introduction.

For my "day job" I work for Machine Intelligence Research Institute, a non-profit organization working to ensure that the creation of smarter-than-human intelligence has a positive impact. So when Friendship is Optimal came out, I was thrilled: it combined all the things I loved: science fiction, technological singularity, friendship and ponies! Author is a huge fan and supporter of MIRI and the story is his attempt to promote their ideas more. Of course, I helped to promote the story, organize the FiMFiction and DeviantArt group for it and read all of the side-stories that came out.

About my friend I cannot say much: he doesn't have an up-to-date English presence online, but he'll be a volunteer at the Crystal Fair and he was the first to contact me when I voiced my idea of a Russian Pony Writing Prompt and helped an awful lot: I even had to tell me to skip organizing a prompt, because I was afraid that he's working too much - that's how super nice a person he is!

I will be in Helsinki from morning, 1st to 7th of July. I would like to stay with as many different people as possible, and we don't want to bother each host by staying for long, so we would like to stay for a day or two with each. Right now we haven't got final agreement on the whole week, which means I'm seeking for someone who could host us on July 1-2, first. If you could host us on other dates, please contact me, too.

Please contact me via PM, email or Skype if you'd like to host me or talk to me. If you decide you may want to host me or meet me in person, please give me your phone number: I don't know when I'll be able to get online after I leave my home.my St.-Petersburg phone: +7 921 889-04-71my Skype: hrenisticemail: listic.pony@gmail.com

If I won't be able to stay with fellow bronies next week, I can always couchsurf: right now I see 1,388 couchsurfers in Helsinki alone, but I think it would be much greater to stay with fellow bronies. If that's okay with you.

My easter friends, I may have solution for your problem, at least for one night.

Me and few friends have a couple of time in a month event, when we make food, listen music and enjoy each other's company, and for best part we sleep with someone's place overn night. Now, it is time to try this international, and if everything goes well, there is sauna, food and place to stay over night for you.I can't promise this, not even trying, bacause these events me and my frinds have are so unplanned everytime, but we are looking few foreigners to join us, and your situation sounds good for us.

So, if everything goes well, if, you can sleep with us, but we are looking for this still, and when CF is ending on friday, we are asking people to join us.

See you soon (hope so, los of people anyway) at the Crystal Fair, just look group of very loud finnish fans, aged 18-30.

PS: because I can't promise anything (bu i am trying), you should still look couch surfing host, just for case.

Please tell me at which date will your "couple of time in a month event" take place so we can plan our trip accordingly? We have ( "3-4" OR "5 - 6" ) AND "7-8" of July open, that is, we've found accomodation for 1-2st of July.

Also please send me your phone number and approximate location to my email: listic.pony@gmail.com, as I'm leaving to Finland in a few hours and my schedule after that may become hectic.

Listic kirjoitti:Thank you very much for your invitation, Twili!We have ( "3-4" OR "5 - 6" ) AND "7-8" of July open, that is, we've found accomodation for 1-2st of July.

We discussed this, checked our schedules, and this our international weekend evening/ night is for 4-5, bacause everyone have so much on their hands right now (and there are those official Operation PON3 parties 5-6).But dont worry, there are plenty of changes for you still, and there is that three hour of nothing before Crystal Fair after parties. We probably have signs in Finlandia Hall or maybe we can borrow microphone for asking people for this, but I inform you, when something is working.

PS: We tried to get sauna for 4- or 5-6, and every one are allready rented.

This is the first time I managed to get online from a computer since I got to Finland. Last 24 hours ago were hectic, as I predicted. Thanks again for your invitation! Please give me your phone number and, maybe, Skype? Approximate location is good too, as I need to plan where and when to go on the evening of 4th. My Skype is hrenistic (portmeneau of Listic and hren = horseradish = piparjuuri), I have it installed on the phone.